Machine Learning Engineer, PhD Intern

Responsibilities

• Work on high-impact problems at the intersection of LLM research, large-scale ML systems, and real-world e-commerce applications
• Query understanding: Use cutting-edge AI and LLM-based techniques to understand user intent, refine queries, and support downstream retrieval and ranking
• Search relevance and ranking: Improve search relevance by incorporating signals from user behavior, catalog knowledge, and generative models, including hybrid retrieval and ranking systems
• Generative recommendations: Push boundaries of generative and traditional models intersection across retrieval and ranking systems; develop scalable feedback and reward modeling approaches for closed-loop learning (RFT)
• LLM evaluation and AIQA systems: Build LLM-based evaluation frameworks (e.g., LLM-as-a-Judge, self-critique) to improve quality and reliability of generative and agentic systems
• Low-latency and scalable LLM systems: Research techniques to deploy LLMs in high-traffic, latency-sensitive production environments, balancing quality, cost, and latency through cascading, distillation, and selective generation
• Knowledge graphs: Work on graph data management and knowledge discovery over one of the world's largest grocery catalogs, integrating structured knowledge with LLM-based reasoning and natural language interfaces
• Sequence modeling: Build temporal models for user behavior prediction

Requirements

• Ph.D. student in computer science, mathematics, statistics, economics, or related areas
• Strong programming (Python, Golang) and algorithmic skills
• Solid foundations in machine learning, algorithms, or optimization
• Curious, self-motivated, and comfortable working on open-ended problems

Nice-to-Haves

• Ph.D. student at a top tier university in the United States
• Hands-on experience with generative or traditional modeling frameworks (PyTorch, Tensorflow, vLLM)
• Prior industry or research internship in machine learning or AI
• Interest and experience in translating research ideas into scalable production systems

Compensation

• CA, NY, CT, NJ: $50/hour
• WA: $47.50/hour
• OR, DE, ME, MA, MD, NH, RI, VT, DC, PA, VA, CO, TX, IL, HI: $44/hour
• All other states: $42/hour